November 05, 2017

A Month of Horribles

October was a ghastly and horrible month for me. Start with three excruciating heat waves. Was it only three? At least three, but it felt like more. You may have heard about the last one -- when the first World Series game began in Los Angeles when the temperature was 103 degrees. This wasn't at noon or 2 PM, mind you: it was at 5 PM. 103 degrees. In my second-floor, non-airconditioned apartment, it was close to 103 degrees, maybe only 96 or 97.

For someone with serious heart disease, who always experiences some amount of difficulty breathing these days, heat like that is a calamity. I can essentially do nothing, not even move around my apartment, except for slow and careful movements a few times a day -- to feed Sasha, to eat a little myself (on the hottest days, I would often just eat a handful of crackers once or twice a day -- also not good for me, but I honestly couldn't prepare or eat anything more -- also my poverty in recent times has gotten me used to eating next to nothing, usually a couple of days a week now, out of necessity). It would take me about a week to recover after these heat waves; by "recover," I mean only to get back to the stage of still being able to do very little, but a little more than utterly nothing.

So the heat and the severely compounded health difficulties basically destroyed October for me. Hence, no writing, for which I offer sincere regrets. I now have the following hanging fire: 1) continuation of Ken Burns series (at least one, more likely two additional posts); 2) a discussion of the ways in which many/most "dissident" writers ultimately capitulate to the terms and arguments of the Establishment, and why; 3) a discussion of autism, including the reposting of a long-lost old article and some additional new observations; relatedly, 4) some thoughts about "science," or what passes for science nowadays, especially with regard to psychology and certain dangerous fictions that almost everyone accepts; 5) thoughts about Mr. Trump and where we are in the life of our glorious (also non-existent) "Republic."

I haven't mentioned items 3 and 4 previously, but those issues are of considerable importance to me. To these articles, I have to add one other: thoughts about the Harvey Weinstein business and related matters. I find most discussion of this subject remarkably unsatisfactory -- superficial, and lacking in genuine understanding of some of the dynamics in play. That's at least one post, but probably more.

So I'm anxious to get to all that, which I will start to do in a day or two, when I feel just a bit stronger. Some of my health problems now make it difficult to sleep sometimes, and that's been especially true the last few nights. I've only been able to get a few hours sleep, and then I have to nap several times during the day. My whole system has been wrecked and is only recovering a small bit in almost imperceptible degrees.

Meanwhile, I scrounged together every penny I could and managed to pay the November rent. I have nothing left. No thing, in terms of money. Can't pay the long postponed electric bill that must be paid by Wednesday ($94); can't pay the internet bill that must be paid by a week from today ($80); can't pay several other bills that are due in the next couple of weeks. And I have no money for food -- spent my last $25 for groceries on food for Sasha. I should try to eat something other than crackers, so it would be nice if I had a few dollars to buy something other than crackers.

As always, I would be profoundly grateful for any donations readers would care to make. I have no other source of income at all, so what I receive in donations here is it. Therefore: Thank you thank you thank you thank you. And thank you!

I'll be back later this week, if not with a longer, complicated essay, then with a couple of short posts on the order of "quick hits." I've been meaning to do that for years, so I think it's time to begin the practice before I'm totally incapacitated. I certainly don't plan to be totally incapacitated in the near future -- but then, people don't usually plan such things, do they? So I'd better get moving.